How to Travel With Carry On Only

Last updated on 27/04/2018 By Alyson Long12 Comments Any post on this site may contain affiliate links. If you use them, they cost you nothing extra. We make a small commission.

If you’ve been following us right from the start, you’ll know that I always said I’d never travel with carry on only. I even wrote a post about why we’d never travel light, we just had too much stuff as long-term travellers and the children were too small for their own, decent sized, packs. Well that was then, this is now and lately we’ve turned to carry on only travel and become quite proficient as our circumstances have changed. These days we’re more like you, we’re taking shorter trips and we have our home base in beautiful Romania to stash the toys and school books along with the all-weather travel gear. Travel is more of a holiday or vacation for us now, rather than our lifestyle so the carry on bags and pared down packing are becoming more normal.

Why Carry On Travel is Easier

The fewer bags you have, the less likely you are to lose one or have one stolen

Dodge budget airline fees for checked baggage

No waiting to check bags in

No waiting at airport carousels for bags to appear

No chance of the airline losing your bag

Easier onward travel by bus, taxi or train

Packing and unpacking are less of a drama

Fewer clothes makes for a simpler life. Minimalism reduces stress

Lighter bags are easier on your body

I should say here that I don’t find any of the above advantages to be HUGE advantages and there certainly are disadvantages. It’s nice to have a big pack that you can dump in the airport or at your accommodation, leaving you with less to carry every day. A few extra minutes at the airport is no big deal and I actually enjoy carrying a full-sized backpack and the convenience of having everything we need. So for big trips, we still take the big packs, every time. But, being based in Europe these days, we fly budget airlines frequently and carry on luggage saves us a lot of money on these short-hop flights making this sort of travel convenient but still for long-term….no way! We need our laptops, camera gear, toys and school books, also laundry every other day is a real bind and ties you down. That said, the kids have never checked a bag. We grown ups carried their school books, toiletries and electronics, so all they carried was a small bag of clothes until they were old enough for adult sized carry on luggage.

Items You Can’t Take in Carry On Luggage

It’s not possible to carry sharp objects when you travel carry on only, so items that were essential to us when we were on the road full-time now have to stay at home. These include

Regular sized bottles of shampoo, sunblock, etc are banned. All liquids need to be under 100ml in volume and be stashed in a clear plastic zip-lock bag. Yes, toothpaste counts as liquid, so does Marmite, as my husband discovered last week. We used to find the idea of buying on arrival or dumping before departure terribly wasteful and unnecessarily expensive, but now, with a home base, we can decant into mini travel-sized bottles or easily stock up on perfect carry on toiletries.

Items We Need For Long Term Family Travel That We Don’t Need for Carry On Travel

Shorter trips are normally focused on one climate, one destination, so multi-climate gear isn’t needed, neither is multi-activity gear. So for Nepal we don’t need swimwear, for London we don’t need sleeping bags, for Sri Lanka we don’t need hiking boots. Shorter trips are much easier to pack for. These days we know before we leave if we’ll need to take our mosquito nets, sheet sleeping bag liners and down jackets, the necessity for big bags is diminished.

Likewise, Lego, Harry Potter Wands, Bakugan and 25 cuddly animals don’t need to travel with us full-time any more. My kids do not take toys, other than 2 essential bears, on short trips ( by that I mean up to a couple of months).

What Bag to Choose for Carry On Luggage

We have 2 main carry on backpacks, one for each child. One is a Mountain Warehouse 45L trekking pack ( no longer available) that we used on our Himalayan trek, the other is the rather splendid Farpoint, below. The adult size works for him at 10 years old, now 11, and hopefully will fit him right into adulthood. It also fits Chef and I so the whole family can use it if we need to.

We’ve invested in the Rolls Royce of carry on backpacks, the Osprey Farpoint 40 ( the Fairpoint is the women’s version). It’s a great bag and comes with a lifetime guarantee but it is slightly, only slightly, too big for Air Asia size regulations. We’re hoping we’ll be OK, we’ll let you know, but there was nothing of a decent standard that met AirAsia’s specifications. This belongs to one of the kids and hopefully will be their luggage for life. UPDATE: We’ve taken the Farpoint 40 on MANY AirAsia and Air Malaysia flights now and never had a problem.

Advantages of the Farpoint as Carry on Luggage:

superb quality

a good, comfortable harness with hip strap

harness zips away when needed

multiple internal pockets and compartments

brightly coloured inside, so much easier to find things

good compression straps for load stability and to make it look smaller at airports.

compart,ments can be padlocked

laptop pocket

lifetime guarantee

perfect EU carry on size

Personally I prefer a back pack, I find them more convenient, others prefer the wheely bags, carry on sized hard luggage on wheels. There are advantages and disadvantages to both, it’s really up to you. We have a post on the choice of backpack, travel pack or suitcase.

Packing List and Tips for Carry On Only

Carry On Only Travel Toiletries

I LOVE this shampoo! It makes my hair fabulous, smells amazing and works for carry on. Click the image.

We’re having great success with solid alternatives to traditional liquid toiletries for carry on only travel. We now always carry solid shampoo bars and solid deodorants. We swear by LUSH products but other solid toiletries are available including tooth powders.

Occasionally, for cold city travel, I pack my travel hair dryer. Since having my hair cut short I don’t take it at all ( this also means no conditioner needed). If you’re looking for the best travel hair dryer, check out this guide.

I’ve not found a satisfactory way of carrying sun block, you will need more than 100ml, buy on arrival.

Medical Kit for Carry On Travel

For short trips, you won’t need to carry a cure for everything. We find, after 3 years of practice, that it’s best to carry a small stock of the things you may need. People rarely get sick or injure themselves near the shop you want.

For longer term or more adventurous travel, I’m never without my travel-sized ear thermometer. With kids it’s better to be safe than sorry and I need to know exactly how bad that fever is. Sometimes I take it when we travel carry on only, sometimes I don’t, I do a mommy risk assessment.

Carry On Only Travel Clothes

One full change of clothes each is all that we’ve found we really need. Usually we carry 2 pairs of trousers, we wear one, pack one. Depending on climate we’ll also pack leggings to use as pajamas or an extra layer. We may carry more tops to allow us to layer in colder weather. This list is per person, we may throw in a few extra T shirts for the kids if there is room. We like to leave with less-full bags so that we have room to buy clothes and souvenirs at our destination.

Carry On Only Travel Electronics

Our major inhibitor with travelling light lies in electronics. We carry camera gear, video gear, laptops, kindles and so on. The kids’ small electronic items, are no trouble. When we’re carrying 4 laptops, carry on only just ain’t happening.

This is what we carry for our family of 4, 2 kids. On long term travel we carry 4 laptops and all the camera gear, for shorter trips we cut it right back. The 3DS, music players etc are for the kids.

Camera and charger (1) I’ve just upgraded to a small DSLR after 12 months of struggling with a broken mirrorless. I’m thrilled! I’m going all ” photographer ” !

Laptop and charger (1)

Plug Adaptors (2)

Kindles ( 1 each) and charger lead (1)

Phones and chargers (2)

Rechargable Power Packs (2) HIGHLY recommended for power-less emergencies, particularly with kids, we’ve tested a few and our favourite is a solar charged version, see our findings by clicking through.

About Alyson Long

Alyson Long is the creator of World Travel Family travel blog. A lifetime of wanderlust and now over 5 years on the road, full time, has made her a travel expert. She is lover of mountains, cultures and ancient civilisations. Fanatical mum obsessed with her kids' education and happiness. Family travel, travel with kids, adventure travel, homeschooling and worldschooling enthusiast. Former medical scientist, now published writer, SEO ninja and webmaster. Very happy nomad so long as there is coffee.

Comments

I just found your blog and I’m in love! We (2 adults, 2 kids under 5) will be spending a bit over a month in Malaysia/Vietnam this winter and I’m devouring your Hoi An posts.
We always travel with carry-on only and that LUSH shampoo is fantastic! Their solid conditioner is very good, too, and that’s what I bring.
We bought an iPad and a dongle that lets us upload photos from our DSLR onto the iPad and stopped bringing the laptop with us.
Oh, a headphone splitter is a must 🙂

I’ve never thought about travel towels and now that I’m facing AirAsia and towelless lodging I really need to go buy some. Thank you!

Thanks for the useful tips! I’m taking carry-on only for the first time with my 3 littlies. Now I will be sure to cut all their nails before we leave and buy suncream when we get there! I will be writing up how I go on my blog when we get back.

Thanks for linking to my carry-on chart! Congrats on going carry-on only. It does have its drawbacks sometimes, but I love the freedom of having less stuff with me. As for sunscreen, I’ve purchased solid sunscreen and it works pretty well. Kind of feels like I’m putting deodorant all over my body, and I have to be more careful to make sure I don’t miss sections, but it seems to work just as well as the normal liquid stuff.

I love the idea of minimalist packing and going carry on only. I reckon if it was just me and my daughter we could do it no problems (she’s even better than me and has fit all her clothes in a tiny 15l (?) backpack for our week away next week)

BUT, we have the other half with his bulky clothes and my son just doesn’t care and throws anything in! I need to go all ninja on them and be in charge but sometimes I just don’t want to.

Hi Kirsty. The kids are easy now thy have their own bags and I don’t have to lug ALL their possessins around the work. The husband can sort himself out! He’s just been in London for 6 weeks, working AND Iron Man training with just his carry o, in the backpack mentioned above. But he didn’t have laptops or cameras with him, just a phone.

Also a good idea, we’ve done that once or twice. Just book a big suitcase for 1 of you. Sometimes it means booking the tickets separately, if you book 4 together it can be hard to specify just one checked bag.

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